Updated: Sen. Wendy Rogers Censured. Not Good Enough, She Must Resign Or Be Expelled From The Senate

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UPDATE: The Arizona Democratic Caucus is demanding Senator Rogers resign:

The Arizona House Democratic Caucus called on white nationalist Senator Wendy Rogers to resign after her Senate colleagues voted today to censure her for threatening colleagues and advocating political violence, but not for her string of anti-Semitic tweets and for speaking to a white nationalist conference last week and praising its openly racist organizer, Nick Fuentes, who then praised Adolf Hitler at the same conference.

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 “Anti-Semitic extremism has no place in the Arizona Legislature, and the First Amendment does not shield against revulsion and the consequences of hate speech,” said House Democratic Leader Reginald Bolding. “As she increasingly embraces extreme anti-Semitism in her public comments, Wendy Rogers has brought dishonor to the Legislature where she serves, and to the United States military, where she served previously. When called out for her abhorrent behavior — where she also insulted the leaders and people of Ukraine as they were being invaded and killed by Russian dictator Vladimir Putin — Rogers doubled down and called for political violence here at home. Then she explicitly threatened to ruin any Republican politician who dared to stand up to her. 

 “We can’t be silent. No one should look the other way on extremism. And no one should accept this member’s winking, transparently false excuses for her behavior. Senate Democrats and most Republicans rightfully voted to censure Wendy Rogers for her threats but should also have included her overt efforts to spread anti-Semitism and the politics of hate and division. Now Governor Ducey should do the same. And Wendy Rogers should do the decent thing, for once, and resign.”

 

Update to Demand That The Arizona Senate Begin Expulsion Proceedings For Sen. Wendy Rogers.

The Arizona Mirror reports, Top Senate Republican says Wendy Rogers could face censure for speech to white nationalists:

Discussions are underway at the Arizona Senate about possibly censuring Sen. Wendy Rogers over her recent inflammatory comments and her speech to a white nationalist conference over the weekend, according to the chamber’s second-ranking Republican.

“We’re talking about that. We’re discussing that. I think it’s better to consolidate on what we’re going to do before we start talking to the media about what we’re going to do,” Sen. Rick Gray, the Senate majority leader, told reporters on Monday.

Gray, a Republican from Sun City, said he had “serious concerns” about the clips he’d seen of Rogers’ comments to AFPAC, as the event is known. Her comment about building gallows were “disappointing,” he said.

“I can say I do not reflect her views. It’s not where I stand,” Gray said.

Rogers also raised eyebrows over the weekend with inflammatory social media posts about the Russian invasion of Ukraine, some of which included well-established antisemitic tropes. She said Ukrainian President Volodimyr Zelensky, who has became the global face of resistance to Putin’s invasion, “is a globalist puppet” for George Soros and the Clintons. She added that he, French President Emmanuel Macron, New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau “all report to the same Satanic masters.”

“I stand with the Christians worldwide not the global bankers who are shoving godlessness and degeneracy in our face,” Rogers wrote on Twitter.

“Globalist” is a common code word used by antisemites to disparage Jews. Soros and Zelensky are Jewish.

Senate President Karen Fann was more restrained in her response. She noted that she and other Senate Republican leaders put out a statement strongly supporting Ukraine in its war against Russia, but wouldn’t comment on Rogers’ other statements or her participation in AFPAC.

“We do have a First Amendment right and anybody is allowed to say anything they want. That doesn’t mean that we, as a Senate body, agree with that,” said Fann, a Prescott Republican.

Fann noted that some members of the Senate are “are having conversations about the rest of the statements that were made.” She wouldn’t comment on Gray’s assertion that a possible censure could be underway, saying only, “We’re not even at that point yet.” She said the Senate will be putting out additional statements and taking action “as needed.”

She added that some senators were still largely unfamiliar with or unaware of Rogers’ recent statements.

“There are a lot of people who don’t follow Twitter and don’t follow the other stuff. I can tell you I have some members that don’t even know of the things that were said over the weekend. That’s why I said we need to have a little time so that people can catch up with everything that’s transpired so that they can make their decisions about how best we should handle it,” Fann said.

Some Republican senators, such as Sonny Borrelli and David Livingston, said they weren’t aware of Rogers’ statements and declined to comment. Republican Sens. Sine Kerr and Tyler Pace declined to comment as well. [They are part of the Sedition Caucus along with Wendy Rogers.]

Others were forceful in their denunciation of Rogers. Sen. Paul Boyer, a Glendale Republican who has found himself at odds with much of his party over his refusal to embrace false conspiracy theories about the 2020 election, of which Rogers is a vocal proponent, or the so-called “audit” that Fann ordered of the election in Maricopa County, was the loudest voice among Senate Republicans.

“They’re disgusting. They have no place in politics, in civil society. They’re ridiculous,” Boyer said.

Boyer said Rogers’ comments were “specifically” antisemitic. Asked if he thought Rogers was a white nationalist, Boyer said she associates with white nationalists, speaks their language and appeals to them. He questioned whether a censure would have any effect, but said other Republicans should speak out against her and expressed hope that voters would remove her from office this year. He also took issue with her invoking Christ and the gospels in her speech.

“I think that we’d still have to make persuasive arguments on the merits of any given policy,” Boyer said. “That kind of … rhetoric is beyond the pale.”

Sen. T.J. Shope, R-Coolidge, was also highly critical of Rogers’ rhetoric and her participation in AFPAC. In a tweeton Monday, Shope referred to Rogers’ comments about Ukraine as “bullsh**.”

Boyer also said he disagreed with Gov. Doug Ducey’s assertion that Rogers is still better than the Democrat she defeated to win office in 2020. Ducey’s political action committee spent about $500,000 to help her defeat Democrat Felicia French. Boyer said he’d rather have a Democrat, even though it would deprive Senate Republicans of their decisive 16th vote.

“It’s completely, utterly bizarre. I don’t even know where that comes from. Talk about something that just doesn’t seem rational at all, as far as thought. Nothing positive to say, that’s for sure,” he told reporters on Monday.

Shope wouldn’t go as far as to say that he’d rather have a Democrat than Rogers, but said, “I would rather have somebody filling that seat that I’m not going to have to explain myself away on a daily basis.”

Shope wouldn’t comment on how he would vote on a hypothetical censure motion against Rogers. He noted that he was the chairman of the House ethics committee and has “tremendous respect” for the process. He said he would have to look at whatever information was presented to him and doesn’t want to “go out of turn.”

Rogers, who boasted in her AFPAC speech that she didn’t run from criticism, would not speak with reporters on the Senate floor on Monday.

Her yellow streak is as wide as 12 lanes of traffick on I-10 in Phoenix.

Republicans in Arizona were largely silent about Rogers on Monday. But GOP members of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, who are derided by Rogers’ wing of the party over false election conspiracy theories and debunked claims from the “audit,” were highly critical.

Bill Gates, the board’s chairman, and Clint Hickman, its vice chairman, issued a joint statement on Monday blasting Rogers for defending Putin, for declaring “that everyone who doesn’t support her conspiracy theories is a Soros puppet, a traitor or a communist” — Rogers has leveled similar criticism at the Arizona Mirror — and for embracing “anti-Semitic, racist and homophobic rhetoric.”

“The United States of America has always been a beacon of hope for those who believe in self-determination and self-governance. At this critical time, we need the world to see that we don’t just preach American values to others but we live them ourselves,” Gates and Hickman said. “Wendy Rogers does not represent American values or interests. I trust other business, community, and political leaders will publicly condemn her hateful, dangerous, paranoid, un-American rhetoric.”

Republican Supervisor Tom Galvin tweeted that Rogers “spreads anti-Semitic tropes in defense of Putin” and wrote, “The AFPAC knuckleheads are not conservatives and I’m all for cancelling white supremacists, Nazi sympathizers, and Putin bootlickers.”

The Arizona Chamber of Commerce and Industry also condemned Rogers for her statements.

“We hope it goes without saying that the Chamber vehemently condemns the anti-Semitic views espoused by AFPAC and its supporters. Elected officials who spread this kind of hateful and divisive rhetoric will have to answer to the voters,” Chamber spokeswoman Annie Vogt said in a statement provided to the Mirror.

The Arizona Chamber of Commerce helped finance Ducey’s campaign to boost Rogers in 2020. The chamber and a PAC it controls gave $140,000 to the governor’s PAC, which spent nearly $3.4 million to elect Republican legislators.

So basically the Chamber is OK with it until someone shoots their mouth off and draws public attention to the fact that the Chamber helped elect this anti-semitic racist to office. See hiw this works?

Looks like I have support for my call for Senate expulsion of Wendy Rogers. Jim Small editorializes at the Arizona Mirror, If Republicans want to send a message that racism isn’t tolerated, censuring Wendy Rogers won’t cut it:

The Arizona Capitol is a bastion of cowards and enablers.

Republicans at the Capitol are hardly tripping over themselves to condemn the Flagstaff Republican for her speech, in which she spoke about building gallows to execute her political enemies, praised the attendees — including prominent figures in the white supremacists movement — as “patriots” and rhapsodized about the greatness of Nick Fuentes, the Holocaust-denier and Hitler-lover who organized the convention.

And it’s no surprise, as politics is a game of access, and access is rarely gained by taking a bold stand against bad behavior. Rocking the boat by confronting a wrong is the way to get ostracized, not to be successful. That incentivizes complicity, and it’s why state capitals are teeming with sexual harassment and bad behavior.

But there are people willing to take stands.

“You’re not a victim @WendyRogersAZ so quit pretending to be one. And stop using Christianity to justify race superiority and executing your political opponents,” Sen. Paul Boyer wrote on Twitter.

That the Glendale Republican was the first to speak out against Rogers is not surprising to anyone who has watched the Arizona Capitol for any length of time, as Boyer is perhaps the only legislator who can be counted on to follow his moral compass over politics — which is exactly why he is more or less an apostate among Republicans in the Trump era, as he refused to go along with the Big Lie and its undermining of our democracy.

[The craven coward] Gov. Doug Ducey won’t say a cross word about Rogers, whose victory was a top priority in 2020 for his PAC, which raised millions of dollars from deep-pocketed businessmen and corporate interests. After all, she’s the critical 16th Republican vote in the Senate, and since that’s much more important than her racism, Rogers is “still better than” the Democrat she beat.

And that’s the key to her survival: She’s indispensable to the GOP agenda. And she knows it, as demonstrated by her taunting Boyer on Twitter after he criticized her.

Sure, a couple of Republicans have had some pointed words for Rogers — Sen. T.J. Shope said her antisemitic, pro-Putin social media posts were “bullshit” — and some GOP senators are apparently mulling a censure of Rogers.

A censure might be a step in the right direction, but it won’t actually change anything.

Shope said he’d “rather have somebody filling that seat that I’m not going to have to explain myself away on a daily basis.” He’s hardly alone in feeling that way. And If that’s true, Republicans should put their money where their mouth is and move to expel Rogers.

The Senate has the ability to determine its own membership and can remove senators from office. It’s rare, but has happened recently: In 2018, the state House of Representatives voted to expel Don Shooter for conduct that was “dishonorable and unbecoming of a member.”

If going to a conference of virulent racists to espouse violent political rhetoric — openly fantasizing about executing political opponents — declaring allegiance to white nationalists, praising them as patriots and saying you “truly respect” a white nationalist leader because he’s “persecuted” doesn’t qualify as dishonorable or unbecoming, what does?

If spouting antisemitic vitriol about “globalists” and cabals of Jews — led by George Soros, of course — who are working to destroy her and run the international finance systemdoesn’t qualify as dishonorable or unbecoming, what does?

Yeah, what I said.

But we know how this will go, because we’ve seen it before. Republicans and their corporate backers [the Chamber of Commerce] will tolerate a lot of overt racism — in fact, they will happily turn a blind eye if it keeps them from having to reckon with the racist attitudes that undergird so much of conservative ideology and have long been at the heart of the GOP.

Take the David Stringer saga: His Republican colleagues at the Capitol refused to call on him to resign or make a move to punish him for publicly saying and writing explicitly racist things. Stringer eventually lost the support of GOP representatives and resigned… but only after it emerged that he was charged with paying an intellectually disabled boy for sex in the 1980s.

Among those who cowardly ignored Stringer’s racism were Senate President Karen Fann, who initially refused to speak out against her seatmate because they were no longer in the same legislative chamber. Two days later, she reversed course after local GOP officials called on him to resign.

Fann is no stranger to bowing to politics over whatever protestations she might make about the evils of racism. In 2019, she defended [Republican Sen. Sylvia Allen] who warned of white people being replaced by scary Brown people who will make America “look like South American countries.” That dangerous ideology, known as the Great Replacement, is popular among white supremacists has inspired violence in America and around the globe.

Less than two days after a gunman targeted an El Paso Walmart to murder Latinos because he believed they were destroying America by “replacing” white people, Fann blamed dirty politics for criticism of [Sen. Allen].

Because irony is clearly dead, that senator was defeated by Rogers, who denounced the “very racist” assertion that America was being ruined by non-white immgrants having children. Last year, Rogers repeatedly claimed that immigrants are “replacing” white Americans and destroying “western civilization.” Fann, of course, had nothing to say about the matter.

The unfortunate reality is that Senate Republicans will not do what they should and expel Rogers because there are political consequences. It would restore some honor and integrity to the legislature and send a crystal clear message that Rogers’ racist bile is unwelcome and unacceptable — but it would mean exhibiting a collective wellspring of political bravery that I’ve never seen at our Capitol.

So, at best, Rogers will face a censure, and Republicans will pat themselves on the back for being oh-so-stern and very-definitely-against-racism. And then she’ll win reelection in November and be seated again in the Senate in January, with the knowledge that she is untouchable.

Surprise me, Senate Republicans.

I’ll go you one better. Wendy Rogers is retired military. It might surprise you to learn that “retired” doesn’t actually mean retired in the military. The Department of Defense can recall Wendy Rogers to active duty for the sole purpose of a court martial. Prosecute her for inciting political violence and insurrection against the government; and for providing aid and comfort to seditious insurrectionists. See, 18 U.S. Code § 2383:

Whoever incites, sets on foot, assists, or engages in any rebellion or insurrection against the authority of the United States or the laws thereof, or gives aid or comfort thereto, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and shall be incapable of holding any office under the United States.

Throw in the usual general misconduct charges under the Uniform Code of Military justice for good measure.

Then send her away to Fort Leavenworth for the next decade, and strip her of her military pension and benefits.

You want to play rough, Wendy, let’s play rough.

UPDATE: Trump-loving Arizona state lawmaker censured in near-unanimous vote for speaking at white nationalist conference:

Trump-loving Arizona State Sen. Wendy Rogers was censured by the vast majority of her colleagues on Tuesday after she delivered an address over the weekend at a white nationalist conference.

As reported by KPNX TV’s Brahm Resnik, Rogers was censured by the Arizona Senate by an overwhelming vote of 24 in favor and just three opposed.

Rogers herself was one of the three senators to vote against her own censure.

Shortly after the censure, a defiant Rogers took to Twitter to attack the colleagues who voted against her.

“I do not apologize, I will not back down and I am sorely disappointed in the leadership of this body for colluding with the Democrats to attempt to destroy my reputation,” Rogers wrote. “In the end, I rejoice in knowing I do and say what is right and I speak as a free American regardless of the actions of this corrupted process today.”

Kick her ass out of the Senate, already.

UPDATE:





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2 thoughts on “Updated: Sen. Wendy Rogers Censured. Not Good Enough, She Must Resign Or Be Expelled From The Senate”

  1. Matt Salmon, no paragon of virtue himself, becomes the first Republican to call on Wendy Rogers to resign from office. “Matt Salmon calls for Wendy Rogers to resign from the AZ Senate”, https://www.azmirror.com/blog/matt-salmon-calls-for-wendy-rogers-to-resign-from-the-az-senate/

    Republican gubernatorial candidate Matt Salmon called on state Sen. Wendy Rogers to resign her legislative seat following her historic censure.

    That amoral coward, Gov. Doug Ducey, whose $500,000 in PAC money helped elect this Neo-Nazi white supreancist to office, still cannot bring himself to even condemn Wendy Rogers for her hate speech, let alone call on her to resign. “Senate censures Wendy Rogers, and all we hear from Gov. Ducey is sickening silence”, https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/laurieroberts/2022/03/01/gov-doug-ducey-still-wont-criticize-sen-wendy-rogers/6979149001/

    Gov. Doug Ducey isn’t speaking out, of course. Oh, he issued a statement after the censure vote, saying that “antisemitic and hateful language has no place in Arizona.”

    But nothing on whether Rogers should have a place in the Senate.

    But then, Ducey made it clear last week that Rogers, who spews racist, antisemitic garbage, is preferable to a Democrat.

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